Yanky Speak on Hat Ton Sai

You pretty much have to be a cyclope not to get any action in Southeast Asia. Seems that as long as you have the necessary equipment and a pulse you'll likely see some sort of jiggy jiggy. For men, it'll be relentless pursuits by Thai women who are after a new wardrobe, some baht and a good time. For women it's pretty much constant flirting initiated by any guy you meet strutting along the well tread tourist spots.


I wasn't quite ready for any of that when I left the monastery. So, I headed straight for Tao Tong Villa's on Koh Tao, turtle island. It's the furthest island from the east coast and a small quiet spot. I arrived and was delivered into a smoking scene like no other. The bungalow I was staying in was up on a hill overlooking my very own spot of ocean and the French woman next to my place took a liking to me. This meant that she would smoke a large spliff and then hand me a snorkelling mask and take me out into the water to explore the technicolored fishies. One day I took a break from the fishies and watched them in the clear, clear water from the restaurant deck. I got bored pretty quickly of watching the fish in the water and walked up to a guy to ask him to look through his guidebook. I didn't get so far because it went from "hello" to "sit down, what's your name?". And that is how I met Ahmi, Sandra and Gavan. Two Iranians and an Irishman. I spent a week with Sandra and Gavan but first we had to ditch Ahmi.


It took Gavan and Sandra a little longer to find their way to Ton Sai beach off Krabi's coast. A walk along a dark path led me to chatting with Helen and voila, I had formed a lovely little team for my time here. Of course there were other people like the Swiss couple, Olli and Christine, and the British couple, Sandy and Sami, but they hung out and dissapeared. Olli, I learnt, was a bun baking champion in his native land. Sandy told me to stop using yanky words and to just tell him how I felt without the yanky speak.


The night's are a blur but I know that one night I crashed a Thai wedding and ate very well. That was followed up by watching a ten year old kid juggle fire, then watching some Thai boxing followed by a snake show. That's the first time I saw a king cobra and I must say that thing scared the crap out of me. If that is the sort of cobra they were talking about in the monastery then I would have wet myself had it appeared in my concrete cell. The animal can raise itself 3 feet off the cround and is more than seven feet long!


My last night on the beach we went out. Sandra had already left and so had cute, adorable Afghan-girl-look-alike Jorge. Gav, Helen and I decided to hang out. The evening started off low key at Chill Out bar and then took a turn when we showed up at Freedom. A bar fight between a man and a woman broke out and Gav had to grab me and pull me away because I did the classic Gina stop and stare.


Then I realized that Gav's male intuition was way off that night. Supposedly Ed was "gay as Christmas." Hearing the words "spread your legs" after Ed lifted me up on the dance floor was not what I expected. At this point I still trusted Gav's intuition. I walked back to Gav and told him that Ed wasn't gay as Christmas. I think the words were "dude, he's just English." In fact he was drunk and high on E. The lady boys liked Ed a lot that night because he was wild on the dance floor. I liked the dance floor a lot that night because there were fire works and a huge limestone formation towering above us as we danced. The night slowly progressed. Gav got some of his stuff stolen off the table in front of us. Then he went and complaint to the staff and got three buckets of drinks. I wasn't drunk. "Ah, go on" was the line of the evening. Apparently it's a popular line from the Irish sitcome Father Ted.

In walked Doog. A strange sort of fellow. Quiet. Gav turned to me and said "now that's the sort of solid guy I was tellling you about." If by solid he meant cheating bastard then he was right on. Doog had a fight with his girlfriend and then wanted to walk me home. The male intuition wasn't working at all that night.



Then it was morning and time to eat breakfast. The Thai guy that had just rubbed my lips with his thumb for no reason at all suggested a place and we followed him. Helen was toasted and then dissapeared suddenly. Gavan checked into my hotel and walked away to get his bags. I knew I wasn't gonna see him again that day. No way. It was 10am and I was just about dead. Needless to say that I had to stay an extra night to sleep off my 'last night' on the beach. Gav walked away and then got into a bong, some more booze and a pool game or two with the bar owner next door. I saw him and Helen again for dinner that night and then breakfast the next day. He did manage to check into my hotel. Helen left for Phi Phi after me.


I did my visa run into Burma from Ranong. A tough Lao/Burmese chick at the Kiwi House helped me out on that one.

That's us. Sandra, Gavan, Helen and me.